Lost and forgotten streets of Manchester .......... nu 78 Gaythorn Street and a pub

I like the way that a demolition site can reveal a rare glance of a building which has pretty much been hidden for a very long time.

The City Road Inn, 2016

In the case of the City Road Inn it is more that it dispels the idea that this is a very big pub.

Seen from the corner of Whitworth Street West and Albion Street the pub looks to be a big place but looks can be deceptive and as Andy’s photograph shows the building is much smaller.

It was built in the late 19th century but stands on the site of an earlier pub which carried the same name back to 1849 when it was the Hawthorn Tavern.

And for those wanting more on the lost streets of Manchester,  Whitworth Street West was originally Gaythorn Street and predates the Rochdale Canal which runs along its northern side.

Gaythorn Street, 1794

As early as the 1790s part of the southern side beside Knott Mill was already developed and within half a century the area was a densely packed mix of small back to backs, some bigger properties and a few closed courts.

And no sooner had the story gone out when P J Thompson added the comment, "When did the nearby Gaythorn Tavern disappear? 

It was still there around 1980-ish."

The Gaythorn Inn, 1971

Now I had assumed that the Gaythorn had gone a long time ago and had become part of the City Road Inn.
But not so and again I have P J to thank who came up with a picture and the comment,

"Definitely not, it was on the junction of Albion Street. and Hewitt Street."

All of which will send me back off into the wonderful realms of research, and of course offer up a thank you to PJ.

Hewitt Street, 1954

And in turn let me wander back across the Local Image collection , where I found this one of the same pub in 1954.

Now I do like it but then I have always been a sucker for pictures through arches.

But as we have strayed someone what from the original post I shall stop three.

Location; Manchester






Picture; the City Road Inn, 2016, from the collection of Andy Robertson, the Gaythorn Inn, 1971, A Dawson, m49641, Hewitt Street 1954 H Mulligan, m26104, courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council, http://images.manchester.gov.uk/index.php?session=pass and the map of the area from Green's map of Manchester, 1794, courtesy of Digital Archives Association, http://digitalarchives.co.uk/

A history of Chorlton in just 20 objects number 12 ....... an engraved silver cup 1917

Continuing the  story of Chorlton in just a paragraph. They are in no particular order, and have been selected purely at random.

Presented to the Wesleyan Church by the Wounded Soldiers of the Wesleyan School Hospital Xmas 1917.  I doubt whether many people know that during the Great War we had two voluntary hospitals here in Chorlton.   One was in the Methodist Sunday school building on Manchester Road and the other in the Sunday School of the MacLaren Memorial Baptist Church on the corner of Wilbraham and Sibson Road.  Sadly little has survived in the form of records.  We have a few newspaper references, letters from some of the medical staff and patients, and a contemporary account in a Red Cross book of the work undertaken to care for the recovering soldiers. So this silver engraved cup is an important object recording not only the gratitude of the soldiers but the voluntary efforts of the people of Chorlton.






Picture; courtesy of Philip Lloyd

Lost on Sidcup High Street, looking for Boots the Chemist

Now I am on a roll.

Having recently wandered up Sidcup High Street in 1961  as far as the old ABC, I back again today.

It is another picture postcard from Tuck and Son but sadly without a message on the reverse.

Still it will bring back memories for some at least with that collection of shops which include Woolworths, K Shoes and Boots.

Picture; Sidcup High Street, from the set Sidcup by Tuck and Sons, courtesy of Tuck DB, https://www.tuckdb.org/

A bit of history on Beech Road ……

It’s Sunday and so it’s left over day.

Left over Sunday, 2026

One of the joys of growing old is the sheer reservoir of food memories that sit ready to tumble out and become one of those simple meals using the odd items which sit neglected and in need of some attention.

101 Beech Road, circa 1901-1921

And while I have embraced that now popular mantra of shop daily and use stuff up, Monday is the start of the week and with that comes the main shopping expedition.

I do smile at that now received knowledge that we should shop everyday and avoid food waste.

As if these twin guides to life are new, and were not practised by my parents, grandparents and a whole legion of Simpson’s, Hall’s, and Bux’s back into the distant past.

Online shopping, the power of the supermarket and the fridge and freezer have rather pushed the daily trip to the local shops into the background.

And well with in living memory here on Beech Road there were three butchers, two grocers, a greengrocer and a fresh fish shop.  

These were replicated in some of the side streets right across what became known as old Chorlton or the old village, names which distinguished us it from the newer community which sprang from the 1880s around the junction of Barlow Moor and Wilbraham Roads.

101 Beech Road, circa 1901-1921

119 Beech Road, 1979

Back then when no one possessed a fridge or freezer there was a necessity in buying your food every day.

Now with money tight it makes sense to buy smaller amounts and avoid the two for one offers unless you can use the lot, which is why today I have used up the last of the green beans, cooking them with some olives, and capers in a sauce from the last tomatoes accompanied with pasta.

I have made my own fresh pasta, and fallen back on shop bought fresh pasta, but dried pasta is cheaper, lasts in the store cupboard and doesn’t take much longer to cook.

So that is it, on left over Sunday it is what ever I can find, and for good measure having eaten my way through a heap of fruit what was left was stewed and became that classic 1950s pud.

Left over Sunday, 2026

Location; Left over Sunday

Pictures; 101 Beech Road, circa 1901-1921, courtesy of Ian Collier, and 119 Beech Road, 1979, from the collection of Andrew Simpson

Snaps of Chorlton No 11, a badge and a festival in 1984 not bad for one post

An occasional series featuring private and personal photographs of Chorlton.

Cheating really, not so much a snap more a picture of the badge of the event

Pictures; from the collection of Andrew Simpson and Tony Walker

Lost and forgotten streets of Manchester .......... nu 2 Pool Fold

Back Pool Fold is one of those twisty little thoroughfares which you think must have a rich and varied history and at sometime have offered up more than a few dark stories.  

Back Pool Fold, 2015

But for now it’s the name that provides a clue to how this bit of the city has changed and it all hangs on the word Back which suggests there must once have been a Pool Fold and sure enough in the late 18th century there was.

It was the continuation of Cross Street which in 1793 terminated at the corner with Chapel Walks leaving Pool Fold to creep up to Market Street past what was then the New Shambles.

And as such would have been familiar to those Dissenters who attended the Cross Street Chapel which dates from 1694 and which is the origin of the name Chapel Walks.

There will be many who remember walking down Chapel Walks past the grassed area at the rear of the chapel and clocking that this was the site of the graveyard.

It vanished under the last rebuild of the chapel in 1997, which is the fourth place of worship to occupy the site.

The first was opened in 1694, and destroyed by a mob in 1715, its successor succumbed to an air raid in December 1940 and the replacement built in 1959 survived for four decades.

Pool Fold, from Market Street to Cross Street, 1793

Now I bet there will be someone out there who can offer up an exact date for the moment that Pool Fold became the continuation of Cross Street.

For now I know that in 1794 it was still going under its old name, and by 1849 had been lost to history.

All of which just leaves me to mention Sam’s Chops House.

It cannot claim to have stood on its present site for that long, having opened at Back Fold Place in the 1950s although it does date back to 1872 when Mr Samuel Studd opened his restaurant under the grander name of Sam’s London Chop House.

It was situated in Manchester Chambers on the corner of Market Street and Pall Mall.

The building has long gone but once and not that long ago this corner was home to the UCP shop which for those who don’t know was the United Cattle Products Company which had a chain of 146 restaurants.

You entered from that corner, went up a large staircase into the restaurant and there amongst many cattle products on offer was tripe.

Once Pool Fold, now just part of Cross Street, 2016

We only went in once and never bothered with the pub next door on Pall Mall.  It was called the Tavern and

I can’t say it looked inviting.  There was one entrance, and the windows ran in a long strip high up on the wall.

All of which may seem a long way from Pool Fold but perhaps not given the connection between the UCP, the Shambles clearly shown on the map and the many meat dishes offered up by Sam’s, but then as a veggie I think that is where I shall close.

Other than to say with all the work on Cross Street in connection with the Second City Crossing it will be interesting to see if anything new comes out of the ground.

After all earlier in the year work was slowed by the discovery of burials along the route which may have been from the Cross Street Chapel.

Next; Tasel Alley

Location; Manchester

Pictures; Back Pool Fold, 2015 courtesy of Andy Robertson, Pool Fold 1793 from Laurent’s map of Manchester 1793, courtesy of Digital Archives, http://digitalarchives.co.uk/ Cross Street 2016 from the collection of Andrew Simpson, 

Walking down Sidcup High Street in the August of 1961

Now it would be a full three years after this picture postcard of Sidcup High Street was sent before we settled in Eltham and a lot longer before I wandered down into Sidcup.

Well Hall had pretty much all I wanted back then and if I did feel adventurous  it was to Woolwich that I went.

So Sidcup in 1961was unknown to me and I haven’t been back since 1966, which means I have no idea to what extent the place looks like it did back then.

Of course the ABC cinema is no more.

It had a chequered history and lasted longer than most, having opened in 1909 as a concert hall, converted into a picture house five years later and getting an Art Deco make over in 1932.

It then went through a number of cinema chains, finally closing in 2000 and demolished three years later.

So had I ventured down into Sidcup in the 60s I could still have caught a film there but given the attractions of the Well Hall Odeon that was never to be.

All of which just leaves me to add that when Alf, Kath and Pauline sent the card on August 9th the weather “was rough but had been a scorcher” the day before.

Now I am hard pressed to remember the August of 1961 or what I was doing, but they may be those who do, and perhaps even what they were doing in Sidcup High Street all those years ago.

Picture; Sidcup High Street, from the set Sidcup by Tuck and Sons, courtesy of Tuck DB, https://www.tuckdb.org/